


theories of entropy and diminishing returns

by ships_to_sail



Category: Schitt's Creek (TV) RPF
Genre: Fluff, Light Angst, M/M, Passing Mentions of The World On Fire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:15:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23353042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ships_to_sail/pseuds/ships_to_sail
Summary: Noah taps at the screen of his phone, his lip caught between his teeth, and between one inhale and the next, Dan isn’t looking at Noah anymore. He’s looking at the ocean, the sun hanging low and orange and bright in the sky. He can hear the fuzzy, muffled sound of music, something plucky over the droning, familiar sound of waves against the sand. The sky is a rusted orange as it hits the water, fading through a pale yellow into the shade of blue that exists only when dawn meets the day. It makes Dan’s chest hurt, the way the ocean always does, expansive and insurmountable and like he’s so inconceivably small. He smiles, even though Noah can’t see him, and he starts to hum along with the melody of the song.
Relationships: Dan Levy/Noah Reid
Comments: 11
Kudos: 52





	theories of entropy and diminishing returns

**Author's Note:**

> Not a word of this is real, and it all exists in a world that looks pretty much just like ours, only Dan and Noah are single and very actively into each other. If any part of that doesn't jive with you, thanks for stopping by and please meet our mutual good friend, the back button. 
> 
> my eternal love to thegreyness for a last minute beta, and the whole of the Rosebudd for making me think any of this was worth seeing the light of day on the internet.

Daniel reaches out for the phone on the nightstand almost before he processes hearing it ring. He can feel the vibration before the piano starts, and every time it rings he hates the past version of himself who thought “Falling” would make a good ringtone. He keeps meaning to ask Noah for a copy of “Lie Here” now that the final studio cuts are done, but the world is upside down and he’s lucky enough to feed himself every day. 

And, like Dan’s errant thoughts summoned him, of course it’s Noah’s face that fills his phone screen. “Hey.”

“Why,” is all Dan says, cracking open a single eye and squinting against the light of his phone, bright in the greying darkness of his room. His eyes flick to the time: 3:47. Far, far before the previously agreed upon ‘decent hour to call, even during a pandemic’ time.

“No, I know,” Noah says with a chuckle, dipping his chin and running a hand across the back of his neck. His eyes are flitting between the phone screen and whatever’s in front of him, and there’s a gentle golden glow behind him that makes the auburn at the edges of his hair glow. Noah hates when people debate the color of his hair, and it’s one of Dan’s absolute favorite things to do. “I just — I thought maybe you’d want to see this.”

Noah taps at the screen of his phone, his lip caught between his teeth, and between one inhale and the next, Dan isn’t looking at Noah anymore. He’s looking at the ocean, the sun hanging low and orange and bright in the sky. He can hear the fuzzy, muffled sound of music, something plucky over the droning, familiar sound of waves against the sand. The sky is a rusted orange as it hits the water, fading through a pale yellow into the shade of blue that exists only when dawn meets the day. It makes Dan’s chest hurt, the way the ocean always does, expansive and insurmountable and like he’s so inconceivably small. He smiles, even though Noah can’t see him, and he starts to hum along with the melody of the song.

“That’s nice — who is that?”

“What’s that?” Noah flips the camera, but then also turns his body, so that Dan can see both him and the shoreline. It means he’s backlit, his features harder to make out, and it makes Dan’s stomach clench with want. He wants to be there, sand between his toes and salty air on his lips and Noah next to him, warm and solid and within six god damn feet. He’s going stir crazy, and they’ve only just started down this path into whatever new landscape the world is about to have. 

“I asked who was playing. I like it.”

“Oh, that’s my friend Will’s new single. I’ll let him know you like it.”

“Hm,” Dan says, smiling again, brighter and bigger, so that Noah can see it, even with his cheek still pressed into the soft cotton of the pillowcase. “How are you?”

“Ah,” Noah says, his eyes falling, phone moving in the facsimile of a shrug as Noah’s shoulders dip. “We’re okay. Mom and dad closed the gallery, and Thea’s pissed because she’s got all this time and no ability to focus on anything.”

“God, I know that feeling,” Dan mutters, rubbing his face against the pillowcase and yawning widely. “How’re your parents?”

“You know them,” Noah says. “Stu’s thinking about making a part of all this into his next subway installment, mom can’t stop worrying about Thea, and the gallery, and the tour —”

“You’re going to postpone?”

“We’re going to have to,” Noah says, his eyes sad. He spins and sinks, the ocean disappearing behind him only to be replaced by the beige edge of a sand dune. He huffs out a sigh and Dan’s palm twitches at a memory: the worn cotton of a grey t-shirt, the shifting landscape of Noah’s back pressed into the broad expanse of Dan’s palm, the early morning hour so egregious it bordered on criminal. He hadn’t been able to must more than a “goodbye” and a “have a safe tour” and an “I’ll call you,” and in his more maudlin hours, he likes to think about what he would have said if he’d known then. Known that would be the last time they saw each other before the world turned upside down, and the borders closed, and everything they’d both worked so hard for looked like it was going to have to play out on a completely different canvas. 

“I’m so sorry, Noah,” Dan says, grabbing his glasses off the nightstand and slipping them on his face as he rolls to his back, phone above him as his hand drifts down to find Redmond buried in the sheets. He feels his dog breathing, and he matches his breath, and watches Noah’s face as he silently sorts through his feelings, putting back the ones he doesn’t think Daniel can handle. 

“It’s what’s best,” he says, because of course he does, and Dan chuckles. 

“I know it is, but — it’s okay to be sad about it, you know.”

“You’re one to talk. How many shows have called to cancel already?”

It’s Dan’s turn to look away and shrug, his eyes shuttering. “I don’t know.”

“You’re a horrible liar, Daniel.”

“Like. Four? Maybe five? I truly don’t know, I’m sure I’ll get  _ another  _ email update today.” He rolls his eyes, and Noah’s giggle is soft, bouncing its way through the phone and into the black cloud already forming at the base of Dan’s spine. 

“Fuck, that sucks.” 

“You’re telling me.” Dan rolls to his side and props his phone on Redmond’s softly moving belly. Redmond lifts his head and glares at Dan before making a little huff motion all his own and settling his head back down. 

“Tell Redmond I said hi,” Noah says, his eyes dancing. 

“Redmond isn’t allowed in bed, you know that.”

“Uh-huh. Tell that to Redmond, then,” Noah says with laughter in his voice, and Dan just rolls his eyes and sucks his teeth and stretches, his long body moving subtly under the sheets. “What’s on your agenda for the day?” Noah’s leaning back on his elbows, and based on the angle it seems like he's got his phone balanced on his thighs. It puts Dan slightly below him, like he’s looking  _ up  _ at Noah, and it cuts the line of his jaw in the early morning light, which looks brighter and fuller with every passing minute. 

Dan’s mind flashes to the last time he looked up at Noah, his eyelashes heavy on his cheek and his jaw stretched around Noah’s dick as Noah wound his fingers through his curls and pulled hard enough to make Dan’s eyes water. Dan reaches a hand up to rub absently at his jaw, and doesn’t miss the way Noah’s eyes track the movement.

“Honestly, I have no idea. More cooking for the masses, I guess. Call Lucky, maybe, or Julia, see if any of them are up for a chat.” He bites off the ‘t’ with a slowly building aggression. The hours of the day stretch in front of him, long and full of a solitude that should be comforting, and restful, but isn’t, because it comes tangled in a knot with a pervasive sense of the unknown, the bitter chew of opportunities he’s waited half a decade for and now won’t get to see to fruition. It makes his teeth hurt, and bile rises in the back of his throat, and he doesn’t know what but it must do  _ something  _ to his face, given the way Noah’s eyebrows shift and the corners of his mouth drop. 

“Maybe Sarah can come by for dinner? She’s still in town, right? I thought I saw she’d rescheduled her press stuff.”

“Yeah, no, she’s in town. She came by to wave yesterday, just. We’re —” 

“ — distancing, yeah. No, of course.” Noah sounds like he’d wanted to forget, more than he’d actually forgotten, and Dan wishes he hadn’t said anything, especially when the next thing Noah says is so unbearably soft, and Canadian, and  _ kind _ , it pricks at the roughest part of Dan. “I’m sorry I can’t do more, Daniel.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Dan says roughly, his voice catching on what he tells himself is a jagged remnant of sleep. “You took me to the ocean in the middle of a quarantine, so. That’s not nothing.”

“Ah, there it is,” Noah says, his phone rocking and shaking slightly as he sits forward and brings Dan up to eye level. “You know I’d much rather you be  _ here  _ here.”

“I do.”

“And you know that I’d also much rather be  _ there  _ there.”

Dan snorts. “No, you absolutely wouldn’t. How’s the song go again…?” He quirks an eyebrow and Noah laughs, loud and long, and Dan feels high, like he’s been flooded with serotonin. 

“Okay, okay, yeah fair enough. But. I’d always rather be wherever you are.”

“Same. Without a shadow of a doubt, same.” A silence settles between them as they take a second just to look. To trace the lines and wrinkles and sleep-softened flaws that make them more beautiful to one another even than they are to the world at large. It’s comfortable, and feels far more lived-in than the house that creaks and groans and comes gently to life around him. “I miss you,” he says softly.

“I miss you, too. Take care of yourself, okay Daniel?”

“I will. Enjoy the water — and wash your hands!”

“I love you.”

“I—yeah. Yes. I love you too, Noah. Call later?”

“Wouldn’t miss it. Make something yummy for me?”

“Pft. Like you’ll be on Instagram.”

“Aw, I don’t know Daniel. It’s the end of the world, never say never.”

“The end of the world. You feeling fine?”

Noah laughs again, and Dan joins him. Before long they’re both gasping for breath and saying goodbye again, and again, and a third time before Dan makes himself hit the red button and toss his phone into a fluffy pile of sheets. 

He stretches again, curling his toes into the down pillowtop on the mattress, wrapping his fingers around the cold metal of the wrought-iron headboard. He tenses every muscle in his body, including the ones in his face, and sighs as he lets them go, relaxes and sinks heavily into the mattress. He lets the sounds around him lull him to the place that isn’t awake, and isn’t asleep. For whatever reason, Dan can’t help but think of a line from one of his favorite movies,  _ “that place where you still remember dreaming? That’s where I’ll always love you. That’s where I’ll be waiting.”  _ And he falls asleep with a little smile that’s still there when he wakes again hours later, sunshine bright, and hopeful where it streams through the tall windows and sets Redmond’s red fur ablaze. 

“C’mon boy,” Dan says, patting him gently on the back, pressing a soft kiss into the silky fur at the base of his neck, breathing in that familiar dog smell. “Let’s go make breakfast.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from ["Beautiful Nightmare"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-McEF185EU) by Will Greenblatt, which of course our favorite Squishy Emo Canadian was listening to as he Instastoried from the beach.


End file.
